stream quality joy you'll save. if you're away from your television just doesn't sit well with your mobile device you can watch your t.v. anytime anywhere. tonight on our t.v. money drugs and public nudity as president obama prepares for his second inauguration a new report looks that profits corporations are making during his first term remember he's being accused of being anti-business but is this what the numbers say find out just ahead. and do the crime face the time many nonviolent drug offenders are locked up for a long prison terms thanks to mandatory minimum sentences are to explores the sentences handed down and asked if the crime fits the punishment. and what mom no pants no you're not seeing things thousands of people show up to ride their subway

in their underwear what's behind this bizarre stunt we'll tell you soon. it's friday january eighteenth eight pm in washington d.c. and meghan lopez if you're watching our t.v. well it's an argument we've heard made time and again over the past four years it echoed through the halls of congress by republicans when president obama was first sworn into office and it was once again reverberated on the two thousand and twelve campaign trail president obama is an enemy to business he's a socialist by nature and by practice that combative rhetoric was brought up once again this week when c.e.o. of whole foods john mackey described the president's new health care law as don't write fascist here's a few other examples of leaders taking shots at the president. every business guy you know when the country is upright rock obama and the way he thinks he wants to

reduce your vision of wealth and the he's a socialist or we have people running the show who seem to really not have the slightest idea how the world works frankly but here's the thing according to him and analysis by bloomberg news corporate profits are the highest they've been under any president since world war two take a look after tax profits are up one hundred seventy one percent the s. and p. five hundred index has gone up eighty percent since the president took office and here are a couple of samples to break down just how well corporations are really doing caterpillar in profits have grown thirty two percent since last year and yahoo profits are up sixty seven percent now whether these profits are because of the president's policies or in spite of them is all in the eye of the holder for more on corporate profits i was joined earlier by r t producer justin underhill and anthony rendez own director of economic policy at the reason foundation i first asked anthony if president obama based on the numbers is really that close to being

a socialist. well it all depends on how you define socialism i think even the president that he's in favor of redistribution of wealth and that's a good things it's all about like the language the language that's used it whether or not it's positive or negative gets gets thrown around for some political reasons but i would say in answer to your question there at the top are these business results the results of the president's policies or in spite of them i think that they are a result of the president's policies we the bush administration and the obama administration bailed out large corporate financial institutions and the federal reserve has spent the past four years with its quantitative easing program providing cheap loans to large financial institutions these two things combined have allowed for corporations to make a lot of money and that's not being realized on main street because all that money more or less just sits with those organizations they're not investing it they've got productivity up all unemployment stays down so i would say it's because of the

president's policies but not necessarily in the ways that he may want to be and just saying i want to get your take we have heard. different corporate c.e.o.'s say that it is in spite of president obama's efforts that they are experiencing this one hundred seventy one percent profits what is your take about these to test them and how president obama stacks up against them considering the stimulus and quantitative easing so corporate profits after taxes are at about one point seven trillion dollars as of two thousand and two and before the financial crisis they were at about one point three trillion after taxes so even even with the financial crisis in between corporations are doing just fine i would definitely say that financial the federal reserve quantitative easing has had an effect but it's also important to consider things like unemployment and low wages as also another factor to consider as to why corporations are doing so well and we've also heard other

things other other. kind of reasons why this the higher profits is happening one of the things that people are attributing to this and they maybe i can pose this question to you is that only one third of the dodd frank act bill requirements are being imposed tell me what type of the role that plays into it. well if you if you're going to look at the results of regulations directly affecting businesses we haven't seen that much of dodd frank actually be implemented and a lot of the final rules that he's been have been announced some some of them like the basel accounting requirements for banks are going to be fully implemented until two thousand and eighteen so in some sense there are certain regulations that are that of the concert are being offered by the fears are for the future the environment of there's going to be a lot of regulations there's a lot of smaller regulations state level regulations and fears about tax code or that's the the rhetoric that business leaders are largely focusing on and where i

do think that today's data is nonce sort of reflecting the reality on the ground is that sure you've got a lot of profits at these large corporations but what we haven't been seeing is investment in the economy and that's the reason why the economy is weak that's the reason why important employment is still significant problem is you can make a lot of money you can borrow money from the fed for basically free and then you can loan it back to the government and make a three percent profit on the free money that you got in the first place and you can rack up a lot of profits but that doesn't necessarily mean that we have a strong economy without actual investment in the economy itself we're not going to see economic growth so just to let's talk about this piggybacking off of what anthony is saying one of president obama's approach is to fix the economy that's kind of this trickle down economics so we're seeing this huge growth in profits on top on the part of corporations is it trickling down and if it's not why not so you

mentioned caterpillar had record profits and what wasn't mentioned is that caterpillar also instituted wage freezes for a lot of its blue collar workers so even though they're making record profits it doesn't necessarily trickle down now there is there are expectations that there might be more hiring in the future so that still has yet to play out we don't know what this will look like and so. it might not it might be a positive thing in the future but we still have yet to see it play out that if companies don't hold on to their money as reserves that means that they need to be investing in the economy and hiring more workers and you brought up the. the i'm sorry you brought up the point as it were the future and how unemployment can affect profits in the future another thing that could really affect it is the new health care law as a lot of people are saying that these taxes are going to play in effect do you think that there will play as they go back to slowing down profits well as of now so corporate taxes for obamacare in the fordable care act those don't come into

effect until two thousand and fourteen so right now when you see corporation complaining about it it hasn't taken effect yet what would be more of a concern is if there are more debt ceiling debates or more more uncertainty in congress that i would see as being a bigger factor than the health care i think the important to look at if you're the if you're a small business guy in middle business guy or even a large corporation and you're going to see a large tax hit your books in the next couple of years when you're looking at expanding your business or investing you are looking down the road so while the one sense i think that there's been a lot of businesses that have been complaining about the president from a political perspective they're conservatives and they're just going to complain about the president no matter what it doesn't doesn't deal with the fears of businesses looking at increased regulatory cost or tax classes one two three four five years down the road and that limiting their investment decisions today and i

think the other thing that's important pay attention to here is when you see industry groups like the chamber of commerce saying the regulatory environment is hitting the economy look at small business and look at entrepreneurship over the last two presidents clinton and bush we saw. eleven jobs per one thousand workers created by new businesses. every year and that number dropped to about seven point eight workers per thousand per year under the under the past four years now that's not necessarily all the president the economy has a lot to do with that but we've seen slumping entrepreneurship at the small business level that that's a huge problem the economy and that is the regulatory environment is a huge reason why we're not seeing more small businesses can trying to compete with the big guys that was anthony around as a director of economic research at the reason foundation and our to producer justin underhill. richard castaldo is no stranger to hardship on april twentieth one

thousand nine hundred ninety nine his life was forever changed by two fellow classmates at columbine high school in littleton colorado after being shot eight times and subsequently paralyzed richard became an advocate in the fight against gun violence even appearing in films like michael moore's bowling for columbine now richard is embroiled in yet another fight this time to save his house and occupy movement is ready to help the survivor overcome once more are to correspondent rhonda leno takes us there. richard chris dodd who may not be the loudest occupy activists but his story makes him a very recognizable figure in the movement long before he started fighting against the american financial system which he sees as corrupt because there was fighting for his life at columbine high school. and i think eight times or nine times i'm still not still not even one hundred percent sure how many times something like

that i just said narrating along with my friend rachel who you know she died. died right next to me basically as the last person to see her alive is pretty horrifying obviously because although it is now partially paralyzed he left colorado to settle here in california because although thought buying a condo would be a smart investment and provide a good place to live with his cat instead he was caught up in the mortgage crisis now the company that owns his loan refuses to negotiate i think more than enough people that are on the street especially since you know i keep saying the banks can pretty much hand in everything which is i think that's going to change. the only free assistance because dollars are confined was with occupy activists which have helped him get legal assistance richard lives here just a couple blocks away from hollywood famous sunset boulevard but the hardships he's had to endure are far from anything which could be scripted here in the capital of

film after surviving an infamous mass shooting richard hopes that his new battle with the banks inspires other homeowners to also fight back i think it's time. for the american people to stay and not even not millions of other homeowners were tempted to buy into deceptive loans just like a stalled do according to court logic which tracks real estate four million foreclosures have been completed since the financial crisis of two thousand eight hundred mourners continue to struggle homeowners continue to lose their homes homeowners continue to be ignored by even those people agencies that supposed to be helping them the national mortgage settlement has been criticized for not keeping people in their homes and awarding banks for providing help to homeowners even though their services were actually just part of normal business practices i'm going to position where i can you know maybe send help shed some light on just kind of. you know show how you know pretty disgusted i am with the whole the whole

system really from columbine to the mortgage meltdown still to his experience much suffering but he uses to be victimized again and stick up for others like him you start a fight every day for justice. right acts today in los angeles remember lindo r t. if you thought the war in afghanistan was the longest war in american history think again since the one nine hundred eighty s. the us has instituted a perpetual war on drugs one of the harshest laws was the anti drug abuse act of one thousand nine hundred eighty six which allowed prosecutors to news mandatory minimum sentences to send thousands of people to jail for years without a judge's approval but now democratic senator patrick leahy wants to scrap minimum sentences altogether he says this one size fits all crime strategy is a mistake are to correspondent liz wahl profiles one family who was caught in the

crosshairs of this type of prosecution it didn't matter they still went to prison in spring of one thousand nine hundred ninety eight karen garrisons twin sons were top students about to graduate from howard university they had dreams of going to law school but that all changed. the informant claimed that they were at the for ten weeks doing drug transaction the man that worked on their car was indicted for cocaine and crack distribution he told authorities the garrisons were involved in the conspiracy his sentence was reduced i think he did like. eleven months something like that i know when they were going in a few months later the investigator told me he was coming it was common. that eleven months pallid in comparison to what the twins faced fifteen and a half years for lawrence and nineteen and a half years for lamont they were charged with conspiracy not possession neither man had prior crimes on their record and there was no other evidence against them

to this day they say they were never involved with the drugs they were sentenced under mandatory minimum laws critics of such sentencing say a one size fits all approach means oftentimes the punishment doesn't fit the crime the mandatory sentences are made by legislators whether it's members of congress or state legislators and they've never laid eyes on you they have no idea what you've done they have no idea how deeply involved you are the origin of mandatory minimum sentences can be traced to nine hundred eighty six when major laws in the war on drugs were passed president ronald reagan touted the drug abuse act as a way to clean up the streets at a time that crack and cocaine abuse was running rampant thirty seven federal agencies are working together in a vigorous national effort and by next year are spending for drug law enforcement will have more than tripled from its nine hundred eighty one levels decades later the war on drugs rages on with many saying it's done more harm than good as

a country i mean we are paying for so many people to be welfare that used to be supported by the person who's now in prison so there's this sort of ripple effect that costs us not only to incarcerate the person but then to take care of the family that's left behind strict drug sentencing for mostly minor offenses floods us jails i just fortunate amount of those that land behind bars are minorities and never noticed that difference in white and black and too used to be in the criminal justice system and they don't hear. and it's what they do if mandatory sentences don't work what's the alternative advocates for reform say it's time to get rid of that because judges are in a better position to decide on fair sentences than congress when somebody goes to prison really the whole family goes to prison because they often lose their breadwinner. they lose a sign they you lose a daughter i mean it's such a deep impact on the entire family it's an impact the garrisons know all too well

but i've tried to fight. this dana. then they've won they have a woman my sons this past christmas was the first one the garrison family spent together and more than thirteen years the once aspiring attorneys say they no longer want to be part of a justice system they call corrupt in washington liz wall r.t. . now this discussion of mandatory minimum sentencing has caught the attention of numerous human rights advocates it's also caught the eye of documentary producer david kuhn he recently made a film about mandatory minimum sentences and relation to drug crimes here's a sneak peek of the film called the house i live in. the war against drugs i think they should the prison guard on my forehead when i was born because it just puts me. right there to go to prison i have

a wife of thirty years and twenty years for drug trafficking i have life without parole for three ounces of meth instead of the twenty six hundred people i've sent the federal prison i've seen three or four were cars through easy for people who are drug they're watching for uneducated people. like me to make sausage. the documentary recently won the two thousand and twelve grand jury prize at the sundance film festival producer david kuhn joined me earlier to talk about the film and explain why mandatory sentencing is such a problem right now. well you heard julie stewart in the segment you ran there say when you put someone in jail from a family you affect the whole family and part of what's happening is people are being put away for a long time for drug offenses we think it's a health problem more than a punishment problem when you have mandatory minimums you take away discretion from the court or the system itself and you remove the ability to treat it like a health problem and say well this person has to get ten years of this person has to get twenty years and they go away for

a long time and we don't really fix the problem we just stuck with the result and it's not working ok so let's talk about the people being sentenced are and also how long the sentences usually range from they can be any number of duration but the problem with the long ones you know you can be put in jail for life for possessing drugs in california recently there was a change in the three strikes law it used to be before this recent election that you could go to jail for life in prison for the rest of your life for a drug possession a nonviolent offenses a petty offense now the laws change it has to be a violent offense for your third offense to receive a life sentence at least that makes a little more sense you know so now the drug offenders are not in that category of life in prison that's a severe penalty for an addict so there must be a better solution and we have to find it ok and we know that the senses are disproportionately applying to people of color how. well originally drug laws if you see the movie the house i live in the drug laws were targeted towards

minorities only and we didn't know about this until we researched the film in india got into it and spent four years making a movie in twenty different states but he learned that originally it was the chinese that were targeted for the use of opium and in california the chinese immigrants were coming in and they were cheap labor pool and the people there were making the laws didn't like that and so they said well how can we remove that cheap labor pool and we can arrest people for being chinese but we can arrest them for using a substance that is associated with the chinese and that was opium and so it went crack was associated with black people we know that forty percent of the crack users supporting percent of the drug users in america are black people forty percent of the crack users are black people that means that by definition the majority of crack users are white people that's not the story that's been told in the media and that's not where law enforcement is targeted so there's been this racial bias from the beginning on how drug laws have been in force ok and let's talk about what inspired you to make this film how did you come up on this day in

the first place well eugene directly is a social issues documentary filmmaker so he makes movies about issues this issue was important to him because someone in his life and each other which you see in the movie. is a black woman who was a caretaker in his home and eugene is very close to her it's like a second mother to him and he learned of her experience and her family's experience in wanted to tell the story of black families in america a severe impact on black families in america are the drug policies of america and eugene saw a story much different than his own so he wanted to get at that and he delved into it for four years and as i said traveled across the country and met a lot of people in and wanted to tell that story now a cock's of the argument that our documentary makes is against drug offenders minor drug offenders but obviously mandatory minimum sentences. base a lot of people for a very a variety of crimes are you saying that you want to outlaw all major toward minimum

sentences or are you more focused on the drug sentencing in particular we're particularly concerned about drug sentencing i think that any time you remove discretion from a sentencing dialog it's dangerous. i think it's important guidelines i think it's important to. guide ourselves in the right direction but to say that you can use your judgment if you're a judge which is supposed to be what you are there to do that's dangerous particularly when it comes to drugs so we're focused on drugs i think we could take a look at mandatory sentences in general though we're not against punishment for deserving cases but there needs to be some discretion ok so let's talk about we only have about a minute left but i have to ask you talk about the cost impacts of minutes minimum mandatory sentencing you talked about it at the beginning a lot about obviously it affects the family as does it also affect the prison system a trillion dollars have been spent in the last forty years on incarcerating forty five million arrested people two and a half million people in prison that's a lot of money some of that money should be used towards rehabilitation it should

be towards getting these people back into a productive life back into their families back into communities where they can be a contributing if you want to be a taxpayer you know and that can help everybody who are spending a lot of money on incarceration in these are going bankrupt so we need to direct the money towards rehabilitation and in the end spending a little towards no sees a lot in the long run david cohen producer of the house i live in i know that your documentary is also available on i tunes on demand and on amazon and i know you're going to be screening it tonight at the shiloh baptist church thank you so much for taking a little time out of your day before the screening to come in to talk about this it's tomorrow and thanks. thanks so much well monday is martin luther king day to day that americans used to celebrate civil liberties and a call for freedom for all but today is also a celebration of sorts cyber activists are calling this friday. day internet freedom day why well because one year ago today what started as

a small online protest became a force to be reckoned with last year we reported about the stop online piracy act as well as the protect ip act better known as sopa and pipa that debate keda came up for a form to bake in congress in response to the bill's internet giants including the likes of wikipedia google reddit craigslist and boing boing ban together in an effort to black out the internet the blackouts purpose was to give computer users and in your face example of how these bills would directly affect online freedom of expression when it comes to copyright laws after the day long protest and subsequent public outcry and lawmakers took notice not only did sopa die a slow when congressionally mandated death but pippa did as well what's more members of the house and senate judiciary committees have yet to hint at revisiting these anti-piracy laws or bills in similar similar in nature so

a small victory for now but a battle that will no doubt rage on in future congressional sessions in order to tame the new wild west of the internet however today's celebration comes amid cyber advocates mourning the death of computer prodigy aaron swartz a death advocates say that should compel others to appreciate their online freedoms but on behalf of our to america happy internet freedom day everyone. before we in the show here's a little bit of humor for you no pants no problem or at least that was the mentality of local subway riders across the country last weekend senator issues aside an r t correspondent on a stasia churkin to shows us how writers are getting cheeky despite the cold weather. we are devoted to. the no pants subway ride and underwear extravaganza that a few friends kicked off in new york a decade ago now an annual celebration marked in dozens of cities across the world

with thousands of participants in the big apple alone to be honest i didn't really know until i got on the subway and like that it was like you know it's you know it to me is like it's like nothing like the. writers try to act as if nothing is staged pretending to have accidentally forgotten their parents at the book points or participants or something they don't know each other that nothing strange is going on so we're going to know that they were filming. they pop in and out of trains for maximum impact but most new yorkers are not jaded they've seen it all you know one way or another i'm just trying to get home and i think i believe that's all right because. things like this all the time. after the ride participants flock outside to celebrate out in the open winter air this year for the thirteenth time it's a family it's nice to feel like the beach is it me or are as they are there really

literally hundreds of people here without parents right now it is not just here where there are literally hundreds of people here and hundreds more coming where you start to hear it i just think it's funny i'm just keep looking at everybody's crotch it's like crap it just still feel free nothing to do with being poor virtual being by the you know is that there's an adrenalin the happens with this thing how old are you under eighteen that we're getting arrested by where there's a real interesting one over there but more like our entity is opposed to. it with drugs like our. well reactions to the idea are mixed more people are certainly warming up to it with numbers of those willing to do this growing every year and. you're just a little humor to lighten up your friday night but that's going to do it for the

news for this week but stay tuned we're working on a whole new lineup for next week first up president obama is making final preparations for his second inauguration eight hundred thousand people are expected to descend on the nation's capital in order to be part of the festivities archie will be covering the united nation in a special edition of the news our to correspondent liz wahl and host of the. breaking the set abby martin will be joining me on the set in order to take an in-depth look at what president obama faces in his second term from u.s. wars to the economy foreign policy to privacy tune in for analysis checklists and much more and another occasion is happening next week it's the fourth anniversary of the day that president obama signed an order promising to close guantanamo bay detention facility it's a promise that the president has repeated as recently as a couple of months ago next week look at the detention facility and where it stands today and speaking of prisons n.s.a. whistleblower john kiriakou is expected to be sentenced to thirty months in prison

next friday it's part of a plea deal his attorneys worked out with prosecutors after he admitted to violating the international identities protection act well the government accountability project is now on during mr kerry aku by unveiling a portrait as part of artist robert shell shell trees a collection called the americans who tell the truth project next week we'll take you there those are just a few of the stories we have in store for you next week along with more news and in-depth interviews so keep it tuned in right here. and that's going to do it for me for tonight for more on the stories we covered go to youtube dot com slash r t america r r t dot com slash u.s.a. follow me on twitter at meghan underscore lopez. none duration days though much more than a point consulting a closer look at president obama's second term dirty even more and more troops and even more invasions of our privacy can end monday january twenty third.